Healthy Spirit

A young boy named Tommy was taken to a ballet by his
grandmother. He had never seen a ballet before and he was
interested in the way the girls twirled on their toes. Tommy
wondered why they did that. He leaned over and whispered to
his grandmother, “Gram, why don’t they just get taller
people?”
Christ is one who can take any person with the smallest of
spirits and make that person spiritually taller. Think, for
example of the tiny nun, Mother Theresa, so diminutive, a
little wisp of a woman. Yet, as a truly dedicated Christian
soul, she stood before presidents, millionaires and billionaires,
people of great power and influence, and she always seemed
so much taller than anyone else in her presence. Is it any
wonder that the Church is putting her on the fast track to being
officially named a saint?
Mother Theresa would tell us that none of us will grow
very tall spiritually unless Christ lives and reigns in us. The
way to become truly “big” people is to have new spirits, filled
with the light and love of Christ. This, of course, is what
happened to Zacchaeus in this weekend’s Gospel. The old
Zacchaeus would not have believed what the new Zacchaeus
told Jesus he was going to do. He vowed to give half of his
wealth to the poor. He vowed to pay back four-fold anyone
from whom he had extorted money. When he heard
Zacchaeus speak from his new and loving heart, Jesus said,
“Today salvation has come to this house!” Zacchaeus had
become right with God and with his neighbor. The little man
had become big!
The Saturday Review once carried a cartoon of a man lying
on a couch with an angry look upon his face. A psychiatrist
was sitting in a chair taking notes. The doctor seemed to be in
shock as he heard his patient say, “Put me back the way I
was.” Zacchaeus would surely say, “Don’t put me back the
way I was. I was lonely and hated before. I was rich and
miserable. I was trying to live for myself and within myself. I
was missing the deeper joys, the satisfaction life has for us
when Christ is given control!
Zacchaeus could surely go on to say, “I am not one inch
taller than I was before; yet, somehow I feel taller inside. I
feel that I am beginning to measure up to the sort of person
Christ wants me to be. I may fall short now and then, but
Christ’s way is the only way to truly grow a big and healthy
spirit!”